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The column that really bombed

But now to far more serious matters and the aftermath of last week's terror attack:

PETER OVERTON: Good evening. At least 22 people killed, at least another 59 injured, a suicide bomber tonight being blamed for the explosion at a pop concert at a stadium in the English city of Manchester.

— Channel Nine News, 23 May, 2017

One of the key aims of terrorists, apart from spreading fear, is to divide us against ourselves and in Australia the Manchester attack did just that.

With the editor of right-wing journal Quadrant Online, Roger Franklin, accusing Aunty of giving succour to the killers of innocent children.

The Manchester Bomber's ABC Pals

— Quadrant Online, 23 May, 2017

Franklin's extraordinary allegation that the ABC chums up with terrorists was based on the previous night's Q&amp;A, where two guests had claimed hours before the attack, that the risk of falling victim to terrorism is extremely small.

Mona Chalabi, the Guardian's data editor, had told viewers:

MONA CHALABI: ... actually, the threat of Islamic fundamentalism, if you want to view it in terms of number of dead bodies, which, as awful as it sounds, is the way to kind of make sense of some threat, actually, really, isn't that present ...

— ABC Q&A, 22 May, 2017

And the distinguished American physicist Lawrence Krauss had added his own graphic illustration:

LAWRENCE KRAUSS: You're more likely to be killed by a refrigerator, in the United States, falling on you.

— ABC Q&A, 22 May, 2017

Statistically that may or may not be true.

But as pictures of the carnage in Manchester flooded through, Franklin went on his own rampage in Quadrant Online, calling Krauss a:

Loathsome creature ... a filthy liar

— Quadrant Online, 23 May, 2017

And suggesting it would have been far better for the world if the night's shocking violence had been visited on the ABC instead:

Had there been a shred of justice, that blast would have detonated in an Ultimo TV studio. Unlike those young girls in Manchester, their lives snuffed out before they could begin, none of the panel's likely casualties would have represented the slightest reduction in humanity's intelligence, decency, empathy or honesty.

— Quadrant Online, 23 May, 2017

Not surprisingly, reaction was immediate. With Twitter leading the outrage.

And Communications Minister Mitch Fifield quickly joined in, calling it a new low in public debate, adding:

And for once, even the ABC's fiercest critics like Chris Kenny agreed, telling his 14,000 viewers on Heads Up.

CHRIS KENNY: Now that was disgusting, that was an absolutely sick and reprehensible intervention ...

— Sky News Heads Up, Chris Kenny, 23 May, 2017

While another right-wing warrior, Nick Cater, who is a director of Quadrant, also condemned it on ABC's The Drum:

NICK CATER: I thought this was just a despicable thing to write ...

... this is absolutely beyond the pale, it is not justified

— ABC The Drum, 24 May, 2017

By this time, ABC managing director Michelle Guthrie had also fired up, describing Franklin's article as vicious and offensive, and demanding that Quadrant's Editor-in-Chief Keith Windschuttle apologise and remove it.

And eventually it was taken down, with Windschuttle, who had initially informed the Sydney Morning Herald that the fuss was bullshit, conceding to Guthrie:

You have my unreserved apology for any concerns it might have given you.

— Keith Windschuttle, Editor-in-Chief Quadrant, 24 May, 2017

Meanwhile, he and Cater both promised that editorial processes will be reviewed.

When Rosie Batty was made Australian of the Year, he tweeted this offensive comment:

If I disregard a protection order I sought and my son dies as a result, can I be Australian of the Year too?

— Twitter, @jolly_rogered, 26 January, 2015

And two months ago, Franklin described Australia's race Discrimination Commissioner Tim Soutphommasane as a race pimp and sinecured Labor hack.

He also constantly refers to Age columnist Clem Ford as Clemydia.

And he has described her newspaper as a brain-damaged rag and written:

It's time for The Age to curl up and die

— Quadrant Online, 10 September, 2013

Indeed, Franklin has always had a way with words, as you can see from this 2009 ABC interview where he suggested Victoria's Country Fire Authority should be taken:

... out to the woodshed and beaten with an axe into some other sort of shape

ABC News Victoria, 19 October, 2009

Franklin has also been in strife with at least one other employer.

In 1998, New York's Observer reported he was sacked as a copy editor at the New York Post after altering a reader's letter.

When the reader, Scott Pellegrino, a producer of WEVD-AM's The Jay Diamond Show, called to complain, Mr. Franklin called him a "dickhead." Mr. Pellegrino got it on tape.

Observer.com, 23 February, 1998

Quadrant's directors have yet to decide Mr Franklin's fate.

But as they contemplate his record and his future they might also consider this appalling paragraph from his ABC article in which he visualises Lawrence Krauss being blown apart by the terrorist's bomb:

Mind you, as Krauss felt his body being penetrated by the Prophet's shrapnel of nuts, bolts and nails, those goitered eyes might in their last glimmering have caught a glimpse of vindication.

Quadrant Online, 23 May, 2017

Quadrant is not just a two-bit rag. It has a proud and storied history.

Tony Abbott has said the magazine has "done more than any other ... to nurture the high culture of Western civilisation".

John Howard has called it the best Australian publication for ideas in 50 years.

And The Australian's foreign editor Greg Sheridan, who is a regular Quadrant contributor, told Media Watch that Franklin's ABC comments were appalling, but:

... Quadrant is a magnificent magazine of first-class intellectual quality, one of the best of its type in the world, and I am immensely proud to be associated with it.

— Greg Sheridan, The Australian, 25 May, 2017

If Quadrant is to retain that reputation can it really keep Roger Franklin as its online editor? I would have thought the answer must be no.